First Grace

50/50. Those were the survival odds the doctor gave me and my mom. After three days of labor, seventy-two hours of agonizing pain, three days of a doctor insisting my mom could have a "natural" birth despite so little progression, the odds weren't good. When a new doctor arrived and rushed us into emergency surgery, he wasn't sure either of us would make it. 

I came into the world a perfectly healthy bundle of eight pounds, covered already in God's grace from my first breath. From even before. I had no damage from our ordeal, not a single health problem.

But I didn't have a name. 

I did, but it didn't work. In the days before ultrasounds, it was all guesswork, but I was supposed to be Jeremy Wayne. The revelation that their only child was wrapped in pink, not blue, left my parents scrambling for a new name. My mom chose Christy Lynn, but my dad had a last minute change of heart. He chose Amanda Michelle.

I don't believe for a second that my name was an accident. My parents didn't know the meaning of it. They didn't have time to research it, like my husband and I did before our boys were born. They just liked it. It wasn't until middle school that I learned the meaning:

Amanda - worthy of love

Michelle - who is like God

Worthy of love. Growing up, I felt anything but worthy of love. I was the skinny, painfully shy, clumsy kid, the one who never quite fit in. Not talented. Not pretty. Not anything special. Just a misfit.

But from the beginning, God saw something else. He saw a little girl with a broken heart and dreams bigger than herself. He knew me.

I wonder sometimes - when did He first think of me? 

He knew me when He spoke the earth into existence, before Adam took his first breath. 

When Jesus went to the cross, when He walked up the hill to Golgotha to be tortured and killed, He knew me - and He knew I would need grace. He gave His life so He could inscribe me on His hands forever.

Before my parents met, before they were born, before their parents were born, He knew me. He knew that from a tangled mess of sinners and praying parents and changed lives would come a little girl who was supposed to be Jeremy Wayne.

He knew me, the little girl who would put her life into His hands. He knew I would mess up over and over, running back to Him for more grace. He knew I would battle fear, taking trembling steps forward, sometimes moving ahead and sometimes cowering in terror. He knew the feelings I would have - that I was worthless, unwanted, unloved. So He gave me a name that would remind me every day that I am loved - Amanda, worthy of love. 

Grace from the first breath. From even before. Grace I can't even begin to wrap my heart around.

It's all grace. Every moment, every breath, every heartbeat is grace. From the first to the last.

Everyday

Saturday is pancake day.

I make my coffee and pull out my Bible and journal, lingering over it all. I savor the peacefulness of a slow start, waiting until sleepy-headed boys stagger into the living room, rubbing their eyes. My oldest now looks me in the eye, and my youngest stands up to my chin. They're hardly my "little" boys anymore. They plop down on the couch until they wake up ever so slightly, then they’re ready to cook.

My youngest has the recipe memorized. He pulls out the flour and baking powder and eggs, insisting on cracking at least one egg. He mixes the batter while my oldest pulls out butter, syrup and peanut butter, all the fixings for later, then starts the stove. He pours the batter and flips the pancakes as I watch. I don't warn him to be careful anymore because he can do this as well as I can. My youngest pulls out plates and forks, ready for the first pancake to come off the skillet.

As we sit down to eat buttery pancakes and crispy bacon, I breathe a silent prayer of thanks for these times with these boys. It's bittersweet. As much as I love it, my heart hurts, because I have such a short time left with them. In five years, my oldest will graduate high school. My youngest will follow in eight. I'm not ready for this season to end. Why won't time just slow down?

Time doesn't slow down, though, so I’m trying instead to slow myself down. I’m savoring little moments—cuddling as we watch TV, family dinners at the table, hours-long Monopoly games as we strategize and munch on chips and cheese dip. I want to spend time talking, really talking, to my kids about the important things in life and the silly little everyday things. I want to laugh with them. I want to burn the memories of this life into my brain, because it won’t last forever. Our normal, our everyday, is changing fast.

I learned from my own growing up years that life isn't made of the big moments. They'll remember those, too—the trips to Disney World, Christmases with piles of gifts, monster truck shows and concerts. But the biggest memories of their childhood will likely be the smallest ones—the snippets of everyday life that happened over and over. They'll remember pancakes on Saturdays, the whole family cuddling and giggling before bed, homeschool work in the Sunday School rooms while their daddy works in his office.

The big things are fun, but life isn't made of big things. It's made of a thousand tiny moments, weaving together to form a big picture. I want my kids to look back and love that picture. I want them to know that in the everyday, they were loved beyond measure.